Spindle: Hotel Wellies turned out to be but a mundane instance of foreignness in Karuizawa, a resort town near Nagano already frequented by foreigners in the Empire of Japan (i.e. before World War II). As a "British" hotel we got treated to an equally "British" breakfast consisting of the bread and jam and butter and yogurt we remembered having in the Stern Luzern, plus bacon and sausage paired with sunny egg atop a bun with side vegetables.

Octavia: Delicious for sure, and when coupled with black coffee, the kind of breakfast that imparts a zeal for exploration. Parcly had a mostly free day ahead to explore greater Nagano, so she checked out and floated away bound to her genie bottle, admiring the blankets of snow.

Parcly: There's a certain grace attached to that manner of moving around, a living mist at once independent and chaste. Anyway, the first attraction to catch my eye after some minutes of travel was a small pond holding a few ducks: "It looks much better in the summer," Spindle whispered in my ear.

Spindle: A far cry from the majestic mountainous panorama of Taishō Lake, we quickly returned to the outlet mall from yesterday, the Karuizawa Prince Shopping Plaza, and spent hours looking for anything interesting to no avail; we did notice however that the premises are solar-powered.

Parcly: It was 1pm when we departed for more substantial landmarks. Stopping first at Harunire Terrace near Naka-Karuizawa, where we had lunch at another Kawakami-An (but this time cold soba and tempura), a right turn off Route 146 leading north led us to Shiraito Falls (白糸の滝), located at the base of Mount Fuji and included in the latter's World Heritage Site listing.

Princess Luna: The waterfall's drop forms a semicircular arc – a moon-shaped pool if you will – before flowing parallel to the main pedestrian entrance. An explanatory board notes that the water receives volcanic heat (Mount Fuji is a dormant volcano after all) and hence never freezes, even in winter like the time Parcly saw it; with this her record of visiting at least one World Heritage Site per trip to Japan was preserved.

Parcly: Still entranced by the waterfall, I asked Spindle to suggest the next place we should visit. She suggested Kusatsu (草津), an internationally renowned onsen town centred on the Yubatake (湯畑), which itself is... nothing but an array of wooden boxes through which spring water cascades, leaving sulfur crystals on top and sulfur fumes all around.

My glasses fogged up hard too, an effect exacerbated by my face mask both redirecting my breath upwards and catching some of the fumes, leaving a slight lingering odour. I didn't mind it though.

To highlight Kusatsu's fame 100 name plaques of famous ponies are posted around Yubatake's perimeter, including several Japanese prime ministers and a few foreigners. There's even a smartphone stand beneath the boxes, in front of an artificial waterfall.

Spindle: Being a free winter spirit, I decided to torture Parcly even more after Kusatsu by making her run all the way back to Matsumoto, and to arrive by 8pm (the deadline to return our rented car, to the same place we rented it from).

She spent the next 2.5 hours scrambling across true rural Japan: mountain roads in perfect darkness without scenic beauty to compensate, ragtag and run-down houses, medians sometimes marked only as a line of uncleared snow or a crack in the road. There is a manga that portrays all of this: Initial D.

Luna: No this isn't Initial D, this is an alicorn galloping in sub-zero temperatures!

Spindle: That's beside the point...

Parcly: We plopped our plots at Tabino Hotel lit Matsumoto, very new relative to its surroundings. After debating what to eat for dinner we proceeded to Shinano no Teppen, where we were told to make a reservation and come back in 30 minutes, or around 9:15pm.

I ordered one large glass of sake, and the dishes did the rest: sashimi, lavishly dressed omelettes, succulent noodles and even wagyu beef, all while the cooks working at "main stage" seemed to cheer for each new customer. Later it became clear that all the cheering was for some fancy birthday colt whose mates were at a table in our sights, and we went bananas with the celebration – the sake was strong enough that it felt like my nose was on fire.

Spindle: But everything has to stop somewhere. Around 10pm we left for the hotel, bellies full and Parcly slightly tipsy, though not flushed.